John Taylor Gatto is an American retired school teacher of 29 years and 8 months and
author of several books on education. He is an activist critical of compulsory schooling and of what he characterizes as the hegemonic nature of discourse on education and the education professions.

John Gatto did undergraduate work at Cornell, the University of Pittsburgh, and Columbia, then served in the U.S. Army medical corps at Fort Knox, Kentucky, and Fort Sam Houston, Texas.
Following army service he did graduate work at the City University of
New York, Hunter College, Yeshiva University, the University of
California, and Cornell.

John Taylor Gatto is the author of great books including, Dumbing Us Down: The Hidden Curriculum of Compulsory Schooling, The Exhausted School, A Different Kind of Teacher: Solving the Crisis of American Schooling, The Underground History of American Education, Weapons of Mass Instruction: A Schoolteacher’s Journey through the Dark World of Compulsory Schooling.